Kadi, it went fine. I had no desire to drink. The friend I went with asked if I'd mind if they had a drink (which I didn't mind at all.) When the champagne toast was poured they poured me seltzer instead. I basically just felt like someone allergic to seafood except I'm allergic to alcohol.

It did remind me that the idea of having one drink is so foreign to me. It would take so many more for me to numb out in the past and it would take just one drink for me to be back there again.

I'm glad the people who slip can get right back on the horse but honestly I'm afraid for me I could never come back to sobriety. That may be a delusion but it keeps me from drinking so why test it?

UGGGGGGGG!!!! JUST HIT THE BACK BUTTON TOO!!

Thought I would be remiss in ignoring SR today. I had a decent day. Prozac is doing something good. I may need to supplement it with something else.

WR2, right about the diet. Essential Fatty Acids in meat are key for my survival. More later. I just wasted a half hour by deleting my post. However I will say that meds are necessary in my case, and a good diet and a lot of other things.

Its 8:40 am.
just sitting here, feeling good. Got through the weekend with no wine. Finished some work, like putting our boat away for the winter, getting the hoist out of the water.
Enjoying the clarity of thought and feelings of motivation.

I was lucky to stumble on this site back in june. I had no idea what I was doing: "enjoying fine wine nightly" my "reward", a way to "unwind after a busy day".... what a load of crap.

Your stories, Elsewhere, Kadi, and Johnny have been really inspiring to me.

Thanks EternalQ again for your insight and being here with us.

Back to the city in a couple of hours then work tomorrow!

w2r, so glad that you had a relaxing weekend. Those thoughts of 'reward' and 'unwinding' ring so true for me too. Even when the alcohol stopped working for me (if it every did), I continued to persist to try to get back to that place where it felt good. I did not see how crazy how I was until I started to saturate myself with stories here. Thanks for being you!

When I was getting ready for work this morning, I realized that my lipstick was getting low. Looked at the tube to see the name of the color. It's called "Pinot", lol. I just can't get away from it. No worries, it's not wine-flavored.

Thoughts. Thoughts. It all begins with thoughts. It's 9:39 in the morning and I'm still abed. Looking out the window. It is a beautiful Indian Summer day. There is a humming bird flying around my new little blue spruce outside the bedroom window. Geese are flying over. I stayed up until 10:00 PM ( gasp ) last night and watched the latest "Breaking Bad" and the latest "Dexter". That was good because I was zombie tired from not sleeping. I went to bed and slept 10 hours. Solid. It felt so good. This morning I feel peaceful but with an aching back. This has been an amazing learning experience, this detox. One I hope I learned the first time around. I went in there and took a couple of Aleve. I know it will probably do nothing for this backache but I have to learn to cope without opiates. I'm suspecting I've had this back pain for a while. It was just masked by my opiate use. Everything looks so blindingly sharp. My mind feels sharp. Painfully so. And I have to learn to be here with it all. It crossed by mind that just one Vicodin would put this back to rights. But I really don't want to go there. I don't have any, anyway. I'm glad. I did not use opiates to unwind or relax. I used them to cover and cope with pain. Mostly fear and angst kind of pain. But physical, too, I'm thinking. Although I was not conscious of that at the time. I was fond of going around boasting that at 62, I was pain-free! Look at me! Look at all the work I can do! Yay! What me? Get old? Hell no! What a load of crap. Crap, crap and more crap. I'm big on telling others to go gentle with themselves but I see that I've been driving myself like a slave driver with a whip. I'm ripped to shreds. I literally do not know who this person is.

Its so common to look at alcohol as relaxation and reward. Hmm, upset stomach, diarheaa, headaches, tension in my back and shoulders, ridiculous stress caused by not doing things when I was busy drinking. Doesn't sound like relaxation and reward when you look at consequences.

I hope everyone is doing well. I haven't had a chance to log into to SR since last Thursday. I miss you guys. I have been very busy with work lately as we have a huge conference coming up in early October which increased my workload, but I am ok with it.

I just finished my 6th weekend sober and it was fantastic. I won't lie and say that I didn't crave a drink because I did Friday evening (again). At least the cravings have been more consistent lately which gives me a heads up and more fighting power. I don't have much to report other than I am still sober and loving every minute of it.

w2r - Glad you had a sober weekend. Wasn't waking up this morning sober and refreshed wonderful? I love my Monday mornings now.

Kandiee - Congrats on your sober time. 28 days is awesome.

EQ - Thank you for posting those links and hanging out in the class. You have helped a lot of us in our early sobriety. I can't thank you enough!

Dee - WELCOME BACK!

Elseware - I hope you get to feeling better. You should be proud of what you have accomplished so far. I am sure with time you will get back to your old self and get to know the person that you really are.

Hi class! I just wanted to check in. I'm still sober, though it's still a struggle from time to time. "Playing the tape" is a Godsend for me. Also stepping back and evaluating whether I'm romanticizing (sp? I'm not even sure that's a real word) alcohol helps. I have trouble when the hubs and I go on a date. Is it really a special occasion or a fancy dinner without wine? Yes. Yes it is. And now I can trade the wine calories for dessert. Also the cooler weather. It's been beautiful here in Ohio. Clear blue skies, temps in the 70s and no humidity. Perfect hammock beer weather. Or perfect sober hike weather, sober bike ride weather, sober dinner on a patio weather. I know the conventional wisdom is the first year is the most awkward in sobriety. You have to relearn how to go through the seasons and whatnot. I'm still hanging in there, though. I hope everyone is doing well. I haven't read all the posts that I missed but I did see that Kadi had a big day at the dentist. I'm so glad it went well for you, lady. You're an inspiration for getting out of that traumatic abusive relationship and soldiering through the psychological aftermath. It's no small feat to leave an abuser. Go. Girl.

Linnie! I remember your little Otter! So glad to hear you are doing so well. Keep it up. I hope you'll check in often.

Morning folks, up for a sober day today I think.

Aw, Linnie, thanks for the kind words. I'm glad you posted about having to go through a round of seasons sober and just dealing with the awkwardness (or newness and delight?) of it all. I was just wondering this weekend how I was going to give out candy on Halloween without drinking wine. I even catch myself obsessing about a plan to get through Christmas and New Year's sober and have to remind myself to just get through the week, lol, or the day for that matter.

High Capacity Washers installed??!! What are they? How do they clean with like no water? Did I put in enough detergent? I only put in a tiny amount of regular stuff. We'll see.

Well, I guess this is progress? P-Zac is not doing the trick. I slept till 1pm went out for a couple of hours and ended up back in bed at 4 till 7. I am fried.

I got a robot call reminding me of an early a.m. appointment with a dermatologist tomorrow morning, that I made months ago. Arrrrrgggg. The chances of me making it there are next to nothing. This is a first appointment, so it's for a full skin workup. I have some scar tissue on my face that is causing issues sometimes. The crazy thing is that I never expected to be at this appointment because I thought I would be long gone out of CT by now.

Never did I expect to be back to where I was when I was in the worst shape of my life and unable to make the appointment for that reason. Haven't been this bad off in 5 years, and not since 20 years ago before that (when I slept for 2 years). Pristiq is next. Talked to the Psych today.

WHAT SHOULD I DO ABOUT THE DOCTOR APT? call in the a.m. at like 7? and go back to sleep. I know they hate that.

You know what, there is no away I'm going to wake up at an ungodly hour and explain the recent scars all over my chest and arms. F-it. I'm blowing it off.

Taking responsibility for obligations is important Johnny, perhaps you can call and leave a message that you can't be there?

I ditto foolsgold on leaving a message so that they get it in the morning.

As for those high-capacity washers, my mom has one. You're supposed to use the detergent marked for them. Sure it'll be fine this time, just for the future.

We had an awesome time at the catfish fry last night, my cheesecake was the best ever. Some beers and wine were had by others, but not to excess, and I didn't mind at all.

Earlier in the day though my AV hatched a clever plan for me to take a 'vacation' from sobriety for a few days, and shut myself away from family and friends for that period so that I wouldn't yell or act like an ass and damage relationships. For about ten minutes my rational brain wanted to buy it, but I kept busy and while doing so started making a list in my head of why that was stupid and wouldn't work. It took about an hour but the AV finally put a cork in it.

You guys are right. Keeping obligations has been next to impossible for the last month. First the work, then the Florida trip which my friend is very sad about. There isn't much I can do about it.

I'll set the alarm for 7 and make the call. I think they open the phone lines over there really early.

The High Capacity washer was magical. I mixed a small amount of detergent in water with a small amount of oxyclean and poured it in the detergent dish. The machine says to use at most half the amount of regular detergent, I used about 1/4. Clothes are stripped of filth with one washing. I'll have to get the special detergent, but this makes things so much easier as far as laundry goes. New big washers and dryers and now a card system instead of quarters.

First clean laundry in a long time. And i showered. I seem to get energy late at night. I talked to the shrink and it's common for real depression for the schedule to reverse itself.

Night. :)

Johnny, I have one of those washers. I love that thing! Good idea about making that call in the AM. I've let people down recently and it's tough to feel that guilty irresponsibility. I'm trying not to do that anymore. You'll be glad you made the call. Are you eating? I actually did well there today.

Foolsgold, that was a strong thing you did, shutting out that urge! Proud of you!

I second that, well done foolsgold!
Sorry you had to miss your appt. Johnny.
I used to like a glass of wine in the hand as well Kadi, especially when cooking.

tonight I went for a 2 hour walk in the river valley, it was dark when I finished.
the leaves have changed color. My senses were alive! An episode of breaking bad, and here I am at 10:15

Normally I would have been sitting numb from wine all evening and ready to fall into bed, for another low quality sleep.

I'm liking this sober stuff!

oh yes, and a finish to my first day 8 :tyou

Hey R2 - I just realized I'm on day 8.

Elseware, yeah been eating fine. Just exhausted. I really don't mind missing the appointment. I was actually going to cancel. I thought it was on the 23rd, but thats my other appointment.

I'm really sick here guys, I'm not booze sick, this illness is real. I'm getting really frustrated and ticked off.

Johnny, I know you're really sick. Depression like yours is real all right. I've seen it up close. It's very hard to understand from the outside. Keep on with your Docs. There will be light soon, I'm sure of it. Don't drink though. You know that only stirs you up. Keep posting. Well keep answering! No judging here!

wr2 and foolsgold you both have done well. So proud of both of you.

johnny - I am sorry you are not feeling well. I hope you get to feeling better soon. I will be thinking of you and will check back on you later.

Thanks Elseware. It's hard when nobody gets it, even your family who have seen it for 20 years and still assume you are just a flake or a freeloader.

I have been scouting around on this site and am learning a whole heck of a lot about addiction and brain chemistry that I had no idea about. I had no idea how destructive and dangerous this "dis" ease of addiction is. I can hardly believe I've done something so terribly self destructive for so many years. I hope I have it in me to recover. I've never been one to do much praying. But I do believe I'm going there. My feelings for myself go so far beyond disgust as to border on I don't even know what. How could I have done this to myself? I love and care about myself more than this. I didn't deserve this. How could I have done this to myself? I'm just blown away now that it has become clear to me. Everything has come into such sharp focus. I can't think how how I let this happen......how could I have done something so bad to my beautiful, God given body and brain? F***! These feelings are really overwhelming.

Don't overload on the knowledge train, Elseware. There's more not known than is known.

There is not a single living human being that actually understands in full how the brain works, or the rest of our body for that matter. And, every single one works slightly differently.

Imagine if you will, that no two cars in the world were manufactured the same, and you were the mechanic in charge of fixing them. Now you know why doctors are less expert in their work than auto mechanics.

Fools gold, you are right. I need to simmer down. By the way, I got dressed and went to a lecture today and then went grocery shopping. It was a little surreal and I was moving slow but a victory just the same.

FG - funny to find you here. I have been posting on the newcomers threads but have missed this group. My sober date is 8/27/13 same as FG. That is a significant number for me. Anyhow, wanted to reach out to the group, since its my SR Family.

FG - I know you think I am crazy quitting the smoke this early but on day 3 and its bc I am feeling it in my lungs. If I feel like a relapse on the booze, I will have a smoke before picking up a drink.

Welcome, jdooner. The more the merrier :)

Elseware, don't you fret about what you can't change. You are doing something now. When we are in our addiction, we're not thinking clearly. Now you're getting clear so all of these thoughts are rushing at you. That's a lot to handle at one time.

Wishing everyone a peaceful sober Tuesday. So grateful for you all.

@jdooner - welcome to the thread. please don't take my pejoratives too seriously, I have a tendency to use words like 'crazy' but I don't mean it literally. Your sobriety is your business, I'm just a bit of an 'odds' guy when it comes to estimating likelihood of success. I think your odds of success are lower taking on too many tough things at a time, that's all I'm trying to say. I want everyone to succeed and get sober, and so your quitting smokes and booze at the same time rang alarm bells for me. I think you experienced a little illustration of my point of view last night and have adjusted your thought process a little, as evidenced above. Sticking that cancer stick in your mouth instead of that booze bottle is still a win if it comes to that.

@elseware - please don't take what I said as criticism, learning what alcohol does inside our brain can be useful, but in reality its all just bad stuff that happens in there, we know that from experience, but the priority has to be clean normal daily living without alcohol. Prayer and meditation or whatever works for you to stay sober has got to be primary, I don't think we should let fancy science knowledge detract from that an iota. I was pleased to hear you did two normal activities today. I'm in that boat a bit myself, just working on getting back to the old sober activities I let lapse.

@johnny - I believe you. And I also believe that you need to do your damndest to have a positive attitude and fight your depression. I suffer from depression myself, and I do believe that we can influence the magnitude of it somewhat by working as best we can to do normal stuff, even if we don't want to or think its pointless. I'm not as debilitated as you seem to be, but please give it a shot if you can. I do see positivity in your responses here sometimes, so it IS in you somewhere.

Wise words, foolsgold. I thought of you today about what you posted awhile back re taking on too much and then feeling overwhelmed. I'm starting to do some of that at work this semester and feeling a bit harried. Need to work on finding a balance.